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A Filipino Party

As I wiped the sleep out my eye, I noticed some light tiptoe through my door. Seeing me still asleep, it grew unhappy as it changed into a scream, "HOY!!! BEN!!! Guising na!!! (Wake up now). Get ready for da party!"

Hugh? Mom? What? Party? WHAT PARTY?!!!! Bursting into my room, my mother shook me up, "Come on! We are going to be late for your father's brother's aunt's second-cousin's friend's sister's party! Hurry up na!"

"WHO?!" I said with a bewildered look.

Disgusted she gave me a "face" as she ran downstairs to the kitchen. Not really in the mood to ask questions so early in the morning, I rolled out of bed to fix my wardrobe. Going for the essentials first I asked myself, "So, where is my good pair of socks?" Yes socks, the most important part of any person's "get-up" when attending a Filipino party.

"No shoes allowed in the house please," so make sure there are no holes and especially no smell. After taking a last look in the mirror I ran down the stairs to catch up with my mom.

"Hi Mom!"

She looked me up and down, then flicked me on the forehead.

"How long does it take you to dress up? Stop your GALABANTING!" She slapped a stack of trays filled with food into my chest. "Takes these to da van. Balis! (Quickly). We are late!"

In the van, my mother flew down the streets swerving and turning. Poor me, stuck in the back, had to stop every tray of food from sliding off the seats. Suddenly my mother took a BIG right, and the rice cooker slammed into my foot. "SAKIT!!! (OWWW!!!) MOM!!! Why do we always do this before parties, hugh?"

If there is anything I find annoying about most Filipinos is that we are always on "Filipino-Time," an hour late to everything. Finally slowing down, I knew we were nearing the party. Actually, we weren't that close yet, maybe three streets still to go, but I could tell as four way streets turned into a single-lane due to double parked Toyotas.

Filipino parties stop traffic, and I mean literally. At times we've been known to make cul-de-sacs into our personal parking lots. Yes, we are bad, driving the neighbors nuts, because we park everywhere except on the driveway. After paying the valet in the culd-de-sac we made our way up to the house for the party.

Just walking to the party we were greeted by millions of Filipinos. "Kamusta ka!?" (How are you!?)

Replying back I said, "Mabuti Po." (Fine Mrs or Mr) Looking around the crowd I saw my barcada (Filipino group of friends) over on the court playing basketball. I tried to go to them, but I was caught, held by the ear. "And where do you think you're going Benhamin?" my mother said. "You must eat pirst (first)."

"She always does this to me!" As long as I can remember my mother has never let me go hang with my friends unless I ate first.

Food is always priority, the sole purpose of going to parties. Sucking it up, I made my way to the kitchen, but as I looked at the table filled with exotic dishes I figured, "It's not too bad" as I found myself a plate. Salivating I took a dozen crunchy brown lumpias (Filipino rolls filled with beef, lettuce and carrots) and a bowl of sinigang (beef stew with sliced carrots, potatoes and lettuce). Placing on my dish a million scoops of rice I complemented my masterpiece with a slice from the lechun (pig) lying on the table, smiling at me. Creepy! Thinking I have got it all I looked around for a place to sit. As I did my eyes stopped.

"She's beautiful!" I gasped as a maganda filipina (beautiful Filipino girl) walked into the room. Her stunning golden skin brought out her shimming dark brown eyes. Watching her she did not walk, but floated across the floor with her long, straight, jet-black hair following right behind her. Passing right by me she put me in shock causing my eyes to lose sight, but her image never left me as her fragrance circulated through my head knocking me unconscious. ::PITICK:: I flicked myself on the head to get back to my senses. Frantically looking around for her I. I.,"I SEE HER!," just near by, only a few food trays away. Having to get closer I looked down at my full plate, tossed it into a corner, and got a new one. Making my way around & down the trays I slowly yet surely got closer. Trying to be as discrete as possible I took up some random pieces of food. I suppose I was despite having filled half my plate with ketchup and the other half with ice cubes. Finally I was right next to her. Within grasp, all possibilities opened. Having closed my eyes I took a deep breath and imagined a successful conversation leading to wonderful things like a girlfriend and even marriage. With so much to look forward to I turned to her, and she kissed me!

"AHHHHH!!!!" My eyes opened up with a jolt. "No way did she just kiss me! But maybe she did." Many happy thoughts raced through my head, but soon those were replaced with a sense of confusion as my cheek was pinched to a numbing red.

My aunts screeched out "Hoy! Ben! What is wrong with you? Don't you kiss your Aunts back anymore?" UGH! What a disappointment!!! Actually it became worse than that as my aunts trapped me into a corner bombarding me with annoying comments and deeply personal questions: "Benjamin you are SOOO cute, cute naman (yes you are)! How tall are you now? Are you wearing lifts because your father was never dat tall! How is it that?" and that would go on, and on, AND ON!!!

In search for a lifesaver, I noticed "the girl" just near us. She was tittering. "Oh, NO!!!" She was listening to every degrading word my aunts were saying. To keep what dignity I had left, I had to get out before they asked me "And Ben, do you hab a pretty gurlprend (girlfriend)?" NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!

Breaking out of that death trap I ran far, far away. Having buried myself in a group of Karaoke-singing-adults, I hid sulking in disbelief.

"Yo Ben. You arite?" I looked to see who it was and saw my close friend Carlos. "Ben, you really shouldn't be up here man. The thick accents of these wanna-be-singers can shatter glass. Yo, come chill wid the crew down stairs."

Glad to see a friendly face, I picked myself up to go hang with my barcada. As I made my ascent down the stairs we entered "The Basement," where the party really got started. The pretty lights flashed through room, bouncing off the disco ball into every direction painting everyone with colors. On the dance floor was my crew. In beat with the techno music the pinoys (Filipino boys) pulled off windmills and other break-dancing power moves. The pinays (Filipino girls) did their couple dances in sync to hip hop beats.

After the teens had their shot on the dance floor it was time for the parents. They were pretty good as they danced the tango, meringue, and salsa (Filipinos have a bit of Latin in them). They danced very well, but its kind of weird to be watching your parents dancing so emotionally with each other. Fathers dipping our mothers, spinning them around and all these other magical things made the teenage girls always look at us boys in disappointment. ::Sigh::.

After every group had got their chance to show their stuff, Filipinos have something that bring everyone together, line dances. "Icky Bricky Heart," "Electric Slide," and the "Macarena" are a few of the dances we do. Our favorite though is the "Todo - Todo," a line dance from our country. It's very similar to the salsa with a few spins and quick steps.

The great thing about the dance though is as we dance, we socialize. It's funny because as you spin you end up facing a different direction and thus towards a different person, so by the end of the song you've probably meet half the people on the dance floor. What a great ice-breaker!

On the dance floor I did some Todo-Todo moves myself. I spun once, twice, and then on the third time WAM!!! Knocked to the floor I said a million "Sorrys!!!" to the feet of the person I bumped into. Finally having gotten up off the floor I heard "Are you OK?" from the loveliest voice in the whole wide world.

Stunned I looked up and saw her, the girl. Boy, she was even prettier close up! I didn't say a word, but stared at her in a daze. ::Applause::Applause::Applause:: Everyone clapped when the song stopped ending their dancing. The noise shook me awake from my daydreaming.

"So you're awake," she said smiling. "I thought I lost you."

Brushing my knees off, I pulled myself together. Finally face to face with her, I readied speak in my best man-voice, but all that came out was a squeaky "Hi, my name is Ben." Embarrassed to the nth degree I held my head down, but out of nowhere I heard her giggle. I looked up and she just kept on smiling at me. I smiled back and from then on it was me and her.

The whole night we stuck by each other. We danced a bit to some salsa. She held my hands to teach me. When we got tired of stepping on each other's feet we went upstairs with the baracada to chill. All the pinoys went straight for to the video games. The pinays on the other hand sat down to watch the national movies of the Philippines, "A Walk to Remember" starring Mandy Moore (Filipinos are convinced Mandy is one of them) and "The Debut" starring "RUFIO!" from "Peter Pan." Rufio is Filipino. He has a real name, but whenever he comes on screen we like screaming "Rufio!!!".

I decided to watch the movies with the pinays and Angilee (àThat's her name). By the time we went through the two movies, it was around five in the morning. Feeling the walls vibrating from the noise down stairs I knew the adults were still partying so we kept on going too. In the time we spent with each other nearly a ton of fried rice was engulfed and about a million games of Pesoy-Dos (Kind of like the card game "War") and Tangits (Kind of like the game "Go-Fish") had been played. Dazing off, I looked around to see everyone sleeping.

Angilee was snuggled on my shoulder. She began to rub her head on my shirt and flutter her eyes open. "Hey. Good morning angel" I whispered. Just then my mom walked.

"Come on Ben. Its time to go." I got up from off the floor and before I took my first step out the door, I kissed her. Looking back at me she said "Mahal Kita (I love you)". All of a sudden a ::GASP::, then a scream ran through the room.

"Oh no you don't!!!" I looked to see who that was and I saw another woman standing beside my mother. Oddly enough those two next to each other looked a bit alike. Actually they looked a lot alike.

"OH!!! Hi Mom!" Angilee said and right then, it hit me. Angilee is my cousin!!! Why didn't I remember in time that any of these pretty girls could be my cousin? Filipinos and their large families.WHY?!!!!!?!?!?!?!?!

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